The nomination of Marta Kos for the position of European Commissioner confirms the adage that politics is “the art of the possible.” She recently left the Freedom Movement party (Gibanje Svoboda). At that time, she said that “it was no longer her party.” On Tuesday, however, the President of the same party said that they have a “great candidate”.
But do they really? Dr Žiga Turk believes that the post of Commissioner requires political experience and political involvement in European political groupings. “The Commission President has expressed the expectation that Commissioners will be former prime ministers, ministers, and, exceptionally, secretaries of state and, failing that, senior diplomats. Ms Kos has been in the diplomatic service for some time, but not as a career diplomat,” he wrote in response to our questions.
So, how can we explain her nomination as European Commissioner? Turk said the following: “On the domestic stage, the personnel scarcity of the new faces is not as striking as when someone has to be sent to the international stage. The media have reported that Kos and Golob are at loggerheads, and it is hard to explain her selection with anything else than the following: either the Freedom Movement party has a very small pool of candidates or, as has been speculated, someone else is choosing the people for Golob’s team and he simply has to put up with it. On the other hand, the Social Democrats (Socialni demokrati – SD) have quite a few people who meet the conditions for the Commissioner that the Commission President wants, and some of them are even women. If I were in the position of Tanja Fajon or Borut Pahor, I would think it a shame that I was not selected. It would also be fair play to ask those who won the EU elections something about the Commissioner’s position.”
The long march to the nomination
A partial answer to the question of how Kos made her way to the nomination as European Commissioner is offered by an insight into her career history. This insight reveals that Kos has been a fellow traveller of the transitional left from the very beginning, but it also reveals allegations of mobbing, collaboration with the Directorate of State Security of the former Yugoslavia (UDBA), and family links to the dominant media.
Marta Kos, a member of the feminist association “She Knows” (“Ona ve”) and sister of the infamous deep state operative Drago Kos, started her career in the media. She reported for the national media outlet Radio-Television Slovenia (RTVS) from Germany for several years, and before that, according to the magazine Demokracija (Democracy), she worked for the German national broadcaster, Deutche Welle, in Bonn. Her first experience of high politics only came during the rule of the Liberal
Democracy of Slovenia party (Liberalna demokracija Slovenije – LDS). In the late 1990s, she headed the Government Information Office. According to the website of the association “She Knows,” the late Janez Drnovšek invited her to his party, but according to Demokracija, he was not too impressed with her. Moreover, he later reportedly showed a clear antipathy towards her. After the baptism by fire in politics, her path led her to the Slovenian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (GZS), and then, before the 2008 elections, she carried out a real political propaganda campaign, warning in the newspaper Dnevnik against the re-election of Janez Janša.
Allegations of mobbing
The reward for political agitation came late. In 2013, then-Prime Minister Alenka Bratušek, who later unsuccessfully ran for the post of Commissioner herself, appointed Kos as the ambassador to Berlin as part of a quota of so-called political ambassadors. There, she “made a name for herself” by taking part in the Pride Parade and political purges, which we have previously already written about.
After 2017, she continued her career as an Ambassador in Bern, Switzerland, but resigned one year before the end of her mandate during the last government of Janez Janša. The reasons given for her resignation were disagreement with the government’s foreign policy orientations and different views on the management of the embassy.
But this was only a press release statement. There were reports of authoritarian leadership coming from the embassies where she had worked. According to the magazine Reporter, the embassy was run in a very strict manner, with employees often being shouted at, humiliated, teased and – unbelievably – even controlled in their private lives. In both Berlin and Bonn, her attitude allegedly led to the departure of two female staff members. Between May and June 2020, the Slovenian Embassy in Bern was subject to an extraordinary inspection. This was led by Diplomatic Supervisor Andrej Graselli. We do not know the exact results of the inspection. However, according to the magazine Demokracija, the surveillance also took place during the time she was in charge of the embassy in Berlin.
From the political margins to the Freedom Movement
During her time in Switzerland, Marta Kos divorced her former husband, Microsoft Slovenia founder Aaron Marko, and then married the Swiss diplomat Henri Gétaz.
During her career, she cultivated links with several parties on the left, but eventually found herself in the ranks of the Freedom Movement. Shortly after the national elections, she became the Freedom Movement’s candidate for President of the Republic of Slovenia, but later withdrew from the race. The exact reasons for her withdrawal are still not known. Even Milan Kučan spoke out against her candidacy, explaining that if she won, all three major political offices would go to members of the Freedom Movement party. A video clip from that period made rounds on the internet, in which Kos almost flew off the handle when Golob said that even Kučan sometimes “makes a mistake.”
Kučan’s concern, however, was completely unnecessary. The opinion polls were not showing a good outcome for Kos, and the support of the domestic public is essential for the election of a President of a country, unlike the election of a European Commissioner. She officially resigned due to personal reasons, but the media outlet “Slovenske novice” (Slovenian News) reported that she had received an ultimatum from Prime Minister Golob – either she resigned for “personal reasons,” or some incriminating information would appear in the media. Shortly afterwards, she quit the party, saying that it was “not her party anymore”. She explained her resignation as direct support for another “resigned” member, former Minister of the Interior Tatjana Bobnar, and then temporarily disappeared from public life.
Is this Golob’s way of trying to make amends for his ultimatum to Kos?
Her name has resurfaced in the public domain in the run-up to the European elections. We reported that she had turned down an offer of the first place on the Freedom Movement’s list of candidates for Members of the European Parliament in exchange for a later candidacy for European Commissioner. The Freedom Movement party then chose Tomaž Vesel instead, who (as we know) was of the wrong sex, which in 2024 is at least as important as the candidate’s competencies, if not more so. Just before he, too, was “resigned”, the name Marta Kos resurfaced. Is this the Prime Minister’s way of atoning for his “ultimatum” to her? Perhaps … But perhaps pragmatic considerations also guided his decision. Marta Kos’s brother, Drago Kos, is married to Tjaša Slokar Kos, editor-in-chief of the news programme 24ur. Therefore, there were also considerations that Golob was thus buying the favour of the most influential media outlet operating under the aegis of the transitional left.
A sin from the past and a fabulous fortune
In the context of her breakthrough into European politics, it is also worth mentioning a particular sin from Kos’s past. In the past, she is alleged to have collaborated with the Directorate for State Security of the Republic of Yugoslavia, which she herself has denied in the past, claiming that it was an attempt to discredit her. The magazine Demokracija, on the other hand, reported that she had a file in the Central Register of the Directorate for State Security with the number 0014000-05448.
Finally, it is worth mentioning her considerable wealth. She disclosed this before she ran for President of the country. At that time, she had 84,000 euros in the bank and 161,000 francs in savings. At the same time, she also disclosed 460,224 euros in securities and capital investments. She has half a million euros in a pension fund. This money is said to have come from the sale of two properties, half of a house in Ljubljana after her divorce proceedings and an apartment in Ravne na Koroškem, which she inherited after the death of her parents. She also disclosed that she has an apartment in Ljubljana and an Audi A6 Avant.
Ž. K.
